That Tuesday Harry receives a mysterious letter with emerald-
green ink in the mail. Before he can read it, Uncle Vernon
snatches it away from him and, after reading its message,
furiously tosses it into the fire. Uncle Vernon then moves
Harry from the cupboard to the spare bedroom upstairs
(Dudley’s toy room) so that Harry will be further from the
front door’s mail slot.

When an identical letter arrives Wednesday, Uncle Vernon
takes more drastic measures and starts sleeping by the front
door, under the mail slot. When three more green-ink
addressed letters arrive Thursday, Uncle Vernon nails the mail
slot closed. Friday, a dozen green-inked letters are pushed
under the front door and into the window of the downstairs
bathroom. Uncle Vernon seized and burned those letters in
turn. On Saturday, two-dozen letters made their way into the
house rolled up inside each of the two-dozen eggs Aunt
Petunia got from the milkman. Aunt Petunia shredded the
letters in her food processor.

On Sunday, after a score of letters flooded from the fireplace,
Uncle Vernon drives the entire family to a faraway hotel.
When Harry receives a hundred letters addressed to his hotel
room, Uncle Vernon confiscates the messages and takes the
family out to a shack upon a small island just off the coast.
As Harry tries to sleep on the cold floor he realizes that his
eleventh birthday is only minutes away. As the minutes until
midnight tick away, Harry hears sounds outside rising above
the din of the storm. Directly at midnight, someone knocks
upon the shack’s door.

Just moments past midnight into Harry’s eleventh birthday, a
giant smashes down the door of the little hut out at sea where
the Dursleys are hiding from Harry’s mail. The giant casually
greets Harry, ties the rifle Uncle Vernon had been holding into
a knot, gives Harry a birthday cake, and introduces himself as
Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of the Keys and Grounds at Hogwarts
(the secondary school for wizards).

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As Hagrid carries on talking to Harry, he is shocked to learn
that Harry knows nothing about Hogwarts, or magic, or his
parent’s death, or even his own fame. Hagrid gives Harry the
acceptance letter from Hogwarts (the message that was in all
those green-inked envelopes), becomes enraged at the
Dursleys when he finds they told Harry his parents died in a
car crash, and tells Harry about Voldemort. Uncle Vernon
and Aunt Petunia make one last attempt to prevent Harry from
going to Hogwarts (Aunt Petunia tells about how her sister,
Harry’s mom, became a freak after going to that wizard’s
school and Uncle Vernon insults Dumbledore, Hogwarts’
headmaster), which only enrages Hagrid more. Hagrid scares
the Dursleys upstairs, and he and Harry spend the rest of the
night sleeping in the shack.

Harry wakes up on the hut out at sea and receives his supplies
list from Hagrid. Hagrid takes Harry to the magical (Muggles
can’t find it) Diagon Alley, where they stop first at the Leaky
Cauldron, a wizards’ pub. There, Harry meets Quirrell,
among others, and finds that he is quite a celebrity in the
Wizarding world. From there Harry and Hagrid go to
Gringotts, the wizards’ bank, where Harry finds that his
parents have left him a small fortune in wizard money.

At the robes shop, Harry meets Draco Malfoy while being
fitted for his uniform. Harry dislikes the spoiled and elitist
Draco at once, and Draco unwittingly makes Harry feel
insecure about not knowing about Quidditch. Harry then
picks up his books and cauldron at Flourish and Blotts, and
directly afterwards Hagrid buys Harry an owl as a birthday
present.

The final stop is Ollivanders’ wand shop, where Harry is
greeted by the eerie and eccentric Mr. Ollivander. Ollivander
has Harry test out a large number of wands before Harry finds
the right wand (before the right wand finds Harry). Curiously
enough, Harry’s wand is made from the same materials that
made up Voldemort’s wand. Hagrid then takes Harry out of
Diagon Alley and sends him on a train to spend the rest of the
summer with the Dursleys.